Historically, telecommunications have involved the transmission of voice and fax signals over a network dedicated to telecommunications, such as the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) or a Private Branch Exchange (PBX). Similarly, data communications between computers have also historically been transmitted on a dedicated data network, such as a local area network (LAN) or a wide area network (WAN). Currently, telecommunications and data transmissions are being merged into an integrated communication network using technologies such as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). Since many LANs and WANs transmit computer data using Internet Protocol (IP), VoIP uses this existing technology to transmit voice and fax signals by converting these signals into digital data and encapsulating the data for transmission over an IP network. However, the integration of telecommunications and data transmissions is still ongoing, and many features that were available to users of traditional telecommunications networks have not been made available to users of VoIP and similar technologies.
Audio and/or video streaming across a communication network may encounter delays that diminish the advantages of real-time communications. If the delay increases beyond an acceptable level, it becomes difficult for users to take turns talking, since one user may not know that another user has begun speaking. As a result, both users may begin speaking at approximately the same time. When this happens, both users soon become aware that they are stepping on each other's words, and both stop talking believing they are allowing the other to finish. After both users stop talking, they will frequently repeat this cycle one or more times, causing more speech stomping (interruptions) to occur. In some extreme cases, the only way to conduct an effective communication session is to communicate as if using walkie-talkies (each participant indicates when they are finished speaking by saying “over”).